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Posted: |
Jun 18, 2015 - 12:26 AM
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By: |
Eric Paddon
(Member)
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A few important words regarding the face that is currently on the $10 bill and why that face is on it.
There would not be a United States of America but for the role played by Alexander Hamilton first at the Constitutional Convention, when he and James Madison together saved this nation from the post-Independence chaos of the Articles of Confederation by devising what became the rock of this nation, the Constitution. And when there were many who were concerned, not unjustifiably about what possible dangers this bold and novel idea of a large Republic that had *never* been tried in the annals of history before (republics had always up to that point been felt to work only in small-sized city-states), Hamilton, Madison and other brilliant minds authored the Federalist Papers, (which sadly long ago ceased to be required reading in many of our college curriculums) which turned the tide and made possible the ratification of the Constitution against very long odds.
As the first Secretary of the Treasury, it was Hamilton who provided the economic and financial foundation of our government that helped to build its credibility as a nation in these difficult early years when our nation faced a test for survival as great as the Civil War would be in the next century where the slightest failure in establishing something that could endure for the long-term could send a new experiment in self-government crashing down and dead before it had a chance to get started.
And it was Hamilton, who as unofficial leader of the Federalist Party in 1800, helped to insure the first orderly and peaceful transition of power from one political party to another when he decided it was time to put an end to the deadlock of the 1800 Election and tell his supporters in Congress that they needed to put partisan sentiments aside and allow the election of Thomas Jefferson as President. After a decade of partisan acrimony that would make even that what we see in today's era seem tame by comparison, America's first test of whether it could transition power peacefully was passed.
Too much has been written in more recent years about Hamilton and his feud with Aaron Burr that resulted in his death, or the more gossipy aspects of his private life that its caused a generation of Americans to lose sight of why men like him, Madison, Jefferson, John Adams and George Washington were not mere "dead white men" less worthy of attention and study in a day and age where our standards for teaching history have been turned upside down in the name of political correctness and we have lost sight of why these men deserved the honors that were given them in their time and in generations past.
Does this mean I am against honoring the centennial of women's suffrage? Not at all. But the appropriate way to do this would have been in the tradition of how we used to honor such events through the production and sale of special commemorative coins. From the time of the 400th anniversary of Columbus through the 1980s, we produced many fine tributes to the likes of Booker T. Washington etc. and I would be all for a similar commemoration then (or for even a temporary change for one or two years only on a coin that regularly circulates as we did with Bicentennial quarters in the 70s). But the permanent representations on our coins and paper money IMO should remain reserved for the truly great figures of our history who were the key to establishing our country and for saving it through times of extreme peril. The more we lose our regard and respect for them by deciding they are somehow no longer worth honoring, the more we do the totality of our country's history a disservice.
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